Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Bad for feng shui is a polite way of saying no gays allowed

New York media has been buzzing about gay couple Barrett Greene and Thomas Eng. These two members of the LGBTQ community are suing Amber Restaurant , a Asian-fusion establishment in New York’s West Village, over the allegation there wedding rehearsal dinner was terminated by a manager that found out the couple was gay.

According to the Huffington Post the owner’s son of the restaurant fired the employee that made the reservation, saying that he did not want any ‘gay parties’ at his establishment because they are “especially bad for feng shui”.

A few points about this whole situation strikes to be either very odd or adds light depending on how you look at it. Since the occurrence of this incident that particular location has closed down. Fong Lin who is the Amber Village manager told the New York Post that the accusation is “ridiculous” and the reservation was canceled because the restaurant was moving.

Let’s just say for kicks this statement is true. Why didn’t the manager just move the reservation to another location? Amber Restaurant seems to have several and one is just as good as any other. Also, why was this mix-up or inconvenience not explained to the couple? It just seems an honest mistake could have been cleared up with communication.

Also a lot of us probably thought that businesses have the right not to serve anyone they want. No one has to give a reason why. A business can refuse service if they don’t want your patronage or is that true? Well in the melting pot that is New York, the SONDA law protects from “actual or perceived” discrimination based on sexual orientation. That is a big stick to swing if you feel that prejudice has raised its ugly head in your pursuit of living a relatively normal and discriminatory free life.

Let’s be real in this situation. Court documents make it very clear that the manager of the Amber establishment made notice of the couple’s sexual orientation and that played a huge factor in the outcome of recent events. Not to encourage this behavior but it would have been easier for the manager just to lie and make up a story. That is how discrimination is done these days anyway.

Whether you are black, gay, Latino, short or whatever; if you don’t want a particular person of distinguishing difference to have the same equality, you make up any excuse that seem to fit. That is how present day prejudice works. No one outright shows there prejudice, out in the open, because of little things like litigation.

The lesson for the day is to treat people as you want to be treated and make no mistake, the LGBTQ is in a position to make examples and this case is going to be closely watched and supported by all members of the gay community.